Is it Monday yet?

Mountain View has come a long way in just the last year or so.  Recently we've been going out in the evenings, Friday or Saturday nights, and have been amazed to find waiting lists at restaurants, young people cruising up and down the strip, families with children skipping along the sidewalk, a veritable mob outside the "Gelato Nazi"'s shop.  Last year you couldn't find a bite to eat past ten o'clock except for at that one chain pho place; last month a new all-night Chinese restaurant opened up (their dim sum - served daily - is pretty good) and was jammed at 2 pm on a Sunday afternoon. 

The people watching can't be beat.  Ace and I recently ate at Nami Nami, and spent the entire meal watching the bouncers outside of the new Buddha Lounge try to look half as busy as the gelato place next door to it.  That place seriously bustles.  So anyway I got a chance to peek inside that Buddha Lounge.  Thursday I skipped out on my Japanese lesson to attend a friend's birthday party there.

The headliner was "No Quarter," a Led Zeppelin tribute band.  I won't lie, I'm not crazy about LZ, but the birthday boy said he hadn't been a fan either, except that these guys were so clearly talented and put on such a great show, that I was bound to enjoy it anyway, as he had.  Tribute bands are inherently kitschy, so I got all tarted up. 

 

 

I put on fishnets and a dress I haven't worn in eight years.  I was going to wear my rock 'n' roll wig, Peta (named after Peta Wilson for its resemblance to the hair of the superblond La Femme Nikita TV show star), but my real hair has gotten too long to stuff up in there without giving me an apparently huge head.  The band did not forget their wigs, though.

Or their nipples.

I revealed my lack of recent clubbing by forgetting earplugs.  The band was astonishingly loud.  So I made do with cocktail napkins. 

I'm sure they were really good - I actually recognized a couple of songs beyond the two I could name.  But it was just so loud, it was impossible to talk to anyone, and I was floored when a couple of friends from high school walked in.

We adjourned to another bar and caught up. 

I woke up tired on Friday, but rallied for the first of our summer events designed to lure our summer clerks into committing to my firm for the long haul.

Karaoke with a judge.  Attendance was implicitly required, but I went with considerable reluctance, because I'm not all that sociable among my coworkers (I never go to happy hours), I'm not crazy about being on stage, my singing talents are extremely modest, and frankly I do not care to look ridiculous among my co-workers and superiors, to say nothing of a sitting federal judge.

Three glasses of chardonnay apparently persuaded me otherwise. 

I ended up climbing into bed at 3:30, and getting up three hours later for a full day of sailing. 

My dad knows how to sail, and my brother was on an extremely successful sailing team in college, so I've always assumed that knowing how to sail is just one of those life skills everyone should have, like knowing how to build a fire or drive stick.  But I went out for the sailing team in college, and the first meeting was just twenty girls gossiping about how sailing was primarily a great way to land a rich husband.  So I never went back, and I've never since learned how to do anything more than 'pull that line - no, the other one!' when someone tells me to.

So this summer we signed up for OCSC's Basic Keelboat Class, the first step in a pretty daunting ($$$) series of hurdles between me and being certified to take a boat out.  It was a great class, though, and I unquestionably learned a lot, really really fast.  I recommend it. 

Immediately afterwards, a friend from run club took us to the opening night of Shakespeare in the Park to see Pericles.  It was a beautiful set and I really enjoyed the show...

but it was bitter, bitter cold.  I was wearing everything I own and then some.  I didn't like how the production nickle-and-dimed you on $2 hot tea, or $2 to rent a blanket...I'd rather pay $5 more for a ticket and get free use of a blanket and feel cared for.  Couching their many fees as "suggested donations" doesn't help.  Charge what it costs you, okay, and lay off the guilt trip.  As it was, we were guests anyway, so my enjoyment was untempered.

Sunday was another full day of sailing, and I could really feel the previous day's lesson start to click.  The weather was beautiful, too, and I was glad of the excuse to be out in it.  But it was another early morning and we were wiped when we finally got home and secretly relieved when our neighbors, who were supposed to come for dinner, begged off. 

 

It was a full weekend that went by really fast, and I have to confess I'm pretty happy I have no plans for this coming weekend. 

Why?  You want to do something?

  

Comments

[Vaguely Urban]

The LZ cheekbones are exquisite!